From the report:
In the new issue of Nature, the neuroscientist Larry Young offers a grand unified theory of love. After analyzing the brain chemistry of mammalian pair bonding - and, not incidentally, explaining humans' peculiar erotic fascination with breasts - Young predicts that it won't be long before an unscrupulous suitor could sneak a pharmaceutical love potion into your drink.The report speculates that an "anti-love" potion could then follow.
Maybe it's been done before, perhaps in some 1950's or 60's Doris Day movie that I can't recall, but doesn't this sound like a good premise for a comedy movie?
Well yeah, it goes back a long, long, long, long way. The first example that comes to mind is the Celtic myth of Tristan and Isolde, where they fall in love due to a love potion. In Shakespeare's time it was already an old convention, which may explain why he has all that business about sleeping potions and poison in the last third of the play - it's a parody of the convention.
ReplyDeleteI think as a plot convention it became less and less common in the 19th and 20th century because of a greater focus on naturalism, etc.
Oh well, my comedy should have cultural resonance then!
ReplyDeleteThe only modern thing I can think of that is a little close is perhaps The Nutty Professor (Jerry Lewis version).